How to remove your private info from all background check sites

We live in a digital age where it seems nearly impossible to maintain your privacy. There are some measures that can be taken to limit your exposure, however. While numerous companies make money by collecting data from public records and selling it to people looking to perform quick and easy background checks, there are ways to stop these companies from tossing around your personal information willy nilly. Reddit user “pibbman” has compiled a list of all the major background check sites that hand out your data to anyone with a credit card, and he has included instructions and links on how to opt out of their services and have your information removed from each site. Of course, be sure to search your name before opting out of any service — you’ll be required to prove your identity to these companies in order to opt out, and there’s no reason to hand over your information if they don’t already have it. Pibbman notes that once you have your personal information removed from each of the major sites he lists, you should also disappear from smaller sites as they seem to pull in data from the “big boys.” Hit the break for the start of this how-to guide, and hit the read link for the rest.

How to remove yourself from each of these have been listed below. I would recommend that you scan some form of ID such as a state issued ID like a drivers license. Black out your picture and drivers number. Leaving your name, address and DOB visible. Any sites that requires such a thing will have an * after the address.

MyLife.com – To request that a Member Profile or Public Profile be deleted, please contact Customer Care at 1-888-704-1900 or contact us by email at privacy@mylife.com. Upon receipt of these requests, and confirmation that you are requesting that your own profile be removed, please allow MyLife 10 business days to complete this removal. It may be necessary to contact you to validate that you are the profile owner requesting the removal. This is to ensure the correct identity and profile ownership before completing these requests, and is for the protection of our users and their privacy.

and as soon as you opt out of all of this another site goes right up with your info…

Anonymous

You can’t stop the internet. You can only hope to contain it.

Anonymous

Man Bear Pig?

Anonymous

Yeah right! That’s like telling a cold call agent that you want to opt-out and to stop calling you. There isn’t anyone governing this crap. They’ll just pass that lead (you) to another agent or company and you’ll still get called. If anything, by you opting out, you just verified your identity.

Anonymous

In the case of telemarketers, you just showed someone lives there.

Anonymous

Exactly…

serpentor

Then you fight back by routing all your calls through Google Voice’s telespam blocker.

Anonymous

tell them you are calling the Attorney General of your state.. If they call back really call.. They won’t bother with the fines, they are real i know a guy who does telemarketing and he’s had his scam company fined a few times before

Anonymous

I am on the do not call registry, so I just tell them that if I mistakenly answer it that I will report it. If its a recording I just report them

http://twitter.com/bezroj Bryant Ezroj

…They don’t make this the easiest thing to do…

http://it-diary.com Rizwan

or you can ask your host for domain privacy when purchasing a domain

http://twitter.com/cefranco2 Carlos Franco

all your info are belong to us…

http://profiles.google.com/mactech84 Stephen Barta

THANK YOU!!!! I have wanted to get rid of stuff like this forever!

Anonymous

so in order to opt out of Intelius, I have to give them a copy of my passport or driver’s license ? WTF?

chris

you really care about privacy? first thing: close your FB account.

http://pulse.yahoo.com/_BT6GGJIG22RMSBO4YPGMSUPJBQ Lidia Allen

I just paid $22.87 for an iPad 2 (64 GB) and my girlfriend loves her Panasonic Lumix GF 1 Camera that we got for $38.76 there arriving tomorrow by UPS. I will never pay such expensive retail prices in stores again. Especially when I also sold a 40 inch LED TV to my boss for $674 which only cost me $62.81 to buy. Here is the website we use to get it all from, CentHub.com

DarkCobra

So let me get this straight . . . in order to opt out, I have to opt in by giving them exactly what I don’t want them to have?

Zack Epstein with another stupid pointless article. Dude is brainless.

http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=637690995 Paulo Silva

are all of these us only? Does that mean we canadians are safe for now?

Asdf

you might opt out for this month, but next month you will be back on. I opted out of zaba search years ago and only a few months later i was back on it. You have to continuously opt out of these sites

Nathanwaymire

Some of these sites ask you to submit your driver’s license or some other form of identification. That’s a really bad idea – those document contain very personal and sensitive information. It’s ridiculous and unsafe…